to be slimmer, fitter, wealthier, and happier each day. Finding good books along the way.

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Book Giveaway - Friends Like These by Danny Wallace

I'm excited to host a giveaway of Friends Like These by Danny Wallace. The giveaway is sponsored by Anna and Hatchette Books Group!

About the Book, from the publisher:

Danny Wallace has friends. He has a wife and goes to brunch, and his new house has a couch with throw pillows. But as he nears 30, he can't help wondering about his best childhood friends, whose names he finds in a long-forgotten address book. Where are they now-and where, really, is he?

Acting on an impulse we've all had at least once, he travels from London to Berlin, Tokyo,
Australia, and California, risking rejection and ridicule to show up on his old pals' doorsteps. Memories of his 1980s childhood-from Michael Jackson to Ghostbusters-overwhelm him as he meets former buddies who have blossomed into rappers and ninjas, time-traveling pioneers, mediocre restaurant managers, and even Fijian royalty.

Danny's attempt to re-befriend them all gives remarkable new resonance to the age-old mantra,
"friends forever!"

About the Author:

Danny Wallace is the author of The Yes Man, now a film starring Jim Carrey. He has hosted various television shows and starred in BBC documentaries. Currently, he has a weekly radio show on XFM in London, and three of his books have been bestsellers in the UK.

This contest is sponsored by Anna and Hatchette Books Group - thank you so much for these generous giveaways!

CONTEST DETAILS

To enter, please share a story about getting in touch with an old friend. The best storytellers will win. Please include your email address, so that I can contact you if you win. No email address, no entry.

The contest is limited to US and Canada only. No P.O. boxes. The contest ends at 6 pm on August 31, 2009.

10 comments:

I have a friend that I met in marriage counseling years ago. She ended up moving to another state for work. Recently she was in town, as she had lost her job so she came out for a visit. When I saw her, it was with another couple-who had similar interests to me. Well they know a group of people that I lost touch with when I got married-and now I am back in touch with them.

My best friend from high school and I lost touch when he went to Iraq. I couldn't find his email address forever, but one day I logged into an old email account, started to type in another email address--and his popped up. It was saved somehow. I found out that he was okay, heading off to afghanistan, and married.amandacatss99@yahoo.com

My roommate from university and I lost contact after graduation - she'd moved out west and I moved around a bit. I often wondered where she was and what she was up to and tried looking her up on facebook a couple of times but never had any luck. Then last fall, my mom (a retired teacher) went to some luncheon for retired teachers and ended up sitting beside Heather's mom. Heather's mom recognized my mom's name and asked her if she was in fact my mother. They started talking about us and it turned out that Heather and her family had recently moved back to the area. My mom gave her mom my e-mail address and shortly thereafter Heather sent me an e-mail. Since then, we've gotten together a few times for lunch, coffee, etc. and it's been great reconnecting. Our sons are fairly close in age so we want to get together as families this summer too.

I met my best friend Sami in the second grade at the bus stop. Sami was the new girl at the bus stop with her little sister Amy, and at one point Sami *kicked* Amy! I was infuriated and yelled at her for it, and she told me she could do it if she wanted!

Well, we had a rocky start, but that was the beginning of a 30-year on again/off again relationship.

In my twenties, I found myself living in WA state. Sami and I hadn't communicated in probably about 8-10 years, since soon after the birth of her daughter. I was about 27 and had recently gotten my first computer. I was learning all about websites like 411 that would allow you to look up and locate people. I started searching for some people that I'd lost contact with over the years, and lo and behold I found Sami again, living in some unexpected place like Alabama or South Dakota. We got back in touch and caught up. Both of us had moved several times since we had last spoken, and she'd had a second child, and her husband had joined the Army.

Throughout the years, life has periodically separated us, but when we find one another again we fall right back into our friendship. Last that I saw or spoke with her was about 6 years ago, and she was preparing to move to Germany. I found on the web that they either have moved back to the US or are preparing to move back. So I've had plans of trying to locate her once again.

She is the one friend that I hope to keep in my life to some degree until the end.

Yes, there's something about getting older and trying to recapture your routes. There are a lot of old friends I've reconnected with, thanks to the Internet.

When expecting my third child I wrote an online blog/journal covering the journey for my distant family to read. An old high school friend did a search and found. She then got my number and left me a message. When listening to it and rewinding it to hear her phone number, my son deleted the message. It took some online research but I finally found a few numbers and just called them until I found her.

Now we keep in touch through e-mail and it's like no time at all has passed. Funny.cabadov(at)hotmail(dot)com

I know this will sound absolutely 'froot loops' lol, but it is a true story about myself and my best friend for nearly 20 years (I will call her Brenna).When she and I first met, at a refunding/coupon swap club, I didn't care for her at all as she struck me as somewhat aggressive and overbearing. Definitely not my 'personality' type, plus I had a one year old child and wasn't too eager to add to my obligations by taking 'on' another friendship.

But, when we found out we only lived ONE block from one another, and through further exposure, our friendship blossomed, developed and grew to such a point that when she passed away with cancer nearly 20 years later I was heartbroken. In fact, my eyes are welling up with tears as I type this.

I loved Brenna more than a sister, and she taught me to respect strength, oh... just so many beautiful facets of her character that I was too blind and busy to see at that first meeting.

Well, ANYWAY - (I know this sounds nuts!) but a few years AFTER her passing away - I had an incredible dream where she lay recuperating in a hospital bed after her cancer ordeal, and showed me that she was very much still alive and all would be well!!! She also showed me how difficult it was to communicate between this life and THAT one, and that while people could not 'see' her, it was possible sometimes they could hear. She took me with her to visit her living Dad in a nursing home, and she whispered in his ear and he became so exicited to know that she really wasn't dead. Even her living husband and son have mentioned to me that they 'still feel her around' and know that she hasn't really gone away yet.

There, I told you this sounded crazy, but in some kind of a mysterious and very blessed way, I feel like my beloved best friend managed to 'reunite' with me, if only for a few moments, to let me know that she was still 'alive' and well :)

One of my best friends in high school went to a new school for Junior year and it was hard for a bit...but eventually our lives changed and I never really saw her. She got into a car accident though and called me from the hospital and I got to see her again and I thought we'd start hanging out more but it never happened...

She started hanging more with another girl I was friends with and I got to see her again...but alas, nothing changed.

Howeverr...just this summer, I ran into her at a store and we exchanged our numbers so we had the right ones and we went out and had a great time. I've been in touch every week or so nowadays and I'm starting to feel that maybe this time we can fully stay in touch. I'd hate to lose her friendship altogether.

My best friend in junior high and high school lost touch once we turned 20 or so. I missed her but never tried to find her. 15 years later she ended up working at the same company that I was working for. It was fantastic and like those 15 years had not passed at all. We both vow now that we are adults that we will never ever lose touch again

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Last summer, my best friend unexpectedly moved out of the country without even telling me; I found out she had left while on the phone with another friend of ours. I didn't hear from her for months which was so odd since we used to talk almost everyday before she left. Then on my birthday, out of the blue she calls me while I was in class to wish me well; that phone call made my day it was so great to have her back in my life. Since then, we have been able to be much better about keeping in touch, we email regularly and skype at least once a week.

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After spending years as a corporate lawyer in a big law firm in NYC, I'm looking into starting my own practice. I have time to explore NYC, learn to cook and eat healthier, exercise, garden (on my Brooklyn balcony), and read more. My interests are very broad from cooking and gardening to real estate, estate planning, tax law, investing and law to escapist fiction of all types to nonfiction and memoirs. I've lived in many countries and cities and love to travel. I love hearing about other people's travels and experiences, so if you have any recommendations of places in your town or somewhere that you'd visited - please drop me a line @ gaby317nyc AT gmail DOT com. You can find me on twitter as startingfreshny.

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